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Sunday, October 31

Special Request: Holocaust



                I was asked to do a post on the Holocaust and because it ties in closely with a previous post I’m going to write about it now. Let me go ahead and say that I am a firm believer that the holocaust did indeed happen. But, I’m going to look at just the facts and try to explain them all as best I can.

                I’ve heard a lot of pieces of “evidence” against the Holocaust, so, to try and best cover as many as possible I’m going to use this person’s article: http://www.biblebelievers.org.au/holohoax.htm. This person has some interesting things to say against the Holocaust, so his points will be the same ones I analyze.
            Fred A. Leuchter is America's leading specialist on the design and fabrication of execution equipment, including homicidal gas chambers. In 1988, Leuchter scraped samples from the alleged gas chamber walls in Auschwitz, Birkenau and Lublin. Cyanide residue would be clearly evident on all these walls if gassings did occur. To his astonishment, Leuchter found no significant cyanide traces in any one of these rooms.” (Unless stated otherwise, all quotes are taken from aforementioned site) This is a very compelling piece of evidence to readers. We are told that a leading expert found no evidence of cyanide...some 40-50 years after the chambers were used. I’m sorry to call a “leading expert” this, but this guy has to be an idiot. First off, Hydrocyanic Acid (AKA Zyklon B) was not used in every single gas chamber, in some cases it was Carbon Monoxide. But even assuming that Hydrocyanic Acid was used in all of these chambers he analyzed, remember he is scraping the walls in an attempt to find not only a forty-year old residue, but a forty-year old SOLUBLE residue. That’s right, Hydrocyanic Acid will dissolve fully in water. This makes it extremely easy for a last minute Nazi to wash away the evidence, or for a rainstorm leaking through the dilapidated structure to wash it all away. Another thing to take into account is that all chemicals deteriorate over time, and cyanide deteriorates quickly (Only taking 20-60 minutes to be reduced to half the initial concentration in a human body). So when you are looking at something that has been sitting idle for more than forty years, you are going to be lucky if you even manage to find an atom.
            The structural integrity of these "gas chambers" is also extremely faulty. These rooms have ordinary doors and windows which are not hermetically sealed! There are large gaps between the floors and doors. If the Germans had attempted to gas anyone in these rooms, they would have died themselves, as the gas would have leaked and contaminated the entire area. Also, no equipment exists to exhaust the air-gas mixture from these buildings. Nothing was made to introduce or distribute the gas throughout the chambers. There are no provisions to prevent condensation of gas on the walls, floors or ceilings. No exhaust stacks have ever existed.” Here is a picture of the gas chamber at Auschwitz:
 If you wish to consider this a room with “ordinary doors and windows” I’m afraid your sense of ordinary is a little bit screwed up. And by the time this area was finally captured most Germans had done whatever they could to hide the evidence. There are holes all over the gas chamber! Here are some photos from a reconstruction made to look exactly like this original: http://www.scrapbookpages.com/AuschwitzScrapbook/Tour/Auschwitz1/Auschwitz08E.html. There is ventilation. As to whether it led to an “exhaust stack” that is not for me to say, but I don’t think it was just some Nazi décor.
            Though six million Jews supposedly died in the gas chambers, not one body has ever been autopsied and found to have died of gas poisoning. We have been shown piles of bodies from World War II, but most of these persons died of typhus or starvation or Allied bombings and a great many of those were murdered Germans, not Jews. Roughly the equivalent of ten football fields should be packed full of gassed bodies to present as evidence, yet not one body has ever been discovered.” As I have already said, Cyanide has a short half-life (the amount of time it takes for the concentration to reach half of what it originally was). Even today people sometimes only find low concentrations of it in the blood on the bodies of people who died of Cyanide poisoning. So that part goes out the window right here and now. I will give them this, most of the bodies in pictures are indeed of other murdered people, not Jews. Gee, I wonder why nobody took any pictures of the people dying in the concentration camps. Maybe because it would be suicidal. Can anyone really expect a camera-bearing citizen to waltz up to the pile of dead bodies and politely ask the Nazi on guard duty if he would be so kind as to allow a photograph of the rotting corpses?
            The Germans documented everything in meticulous detail from shrubbery to arbors, but no pre-war or wartime plans or documents exist that detail or even mention any gas chambers for reasons of genocide. All documents ever presented were drawn up AFTER the war.” I don’t remember ever hearing that the Germans documented anything at all…
            “Even if we threw away all the evidence and accounted for every so-called gas chamber, it would have taken 68 YEARS to accomplish gassing six million Jews! “ Some reports say that as many as 700-800 people were shoved into gas chambers at a time. Therefore this statement can only be classified as an ALGEBRA FAIL. Even if only 700 people were gassed a day, it would only take 4 years for more than a million people to be gassed. If you had, say six chambers, you could reach the full six million in four years with just 700 a day. Not to mention "six million" is a total death count, and not all of them were gassed to death.
            Even The Diary of Anne Frank is a hoax. Portions of the diary were written with a ball point pen. These pens were not in use at the time Anne Frank lived.” The first ball-point pen was made in 1888 and similar pens have been used ever since.
It is not denied concentration camps existed. Tragically, many died of typhus or starvation, as often happens in such situations. There is, however, no evidence that any gassings occurred for the reasons of genocide.” Other than hundreds of testimonies, no there isn’t. Either way, people were gassed, even if it was just prisoners of war.
“It is an interesting fact that the number of so-called persecuted Jews KEEPS INCREASING. Hal Greenwald, program director for the Hillel Foundation at Duke University, a Jewish student group, has been promoting the idea that NINE MILLION JEWS WERE EXTERMINATED IN HITLER'S GAS CHAMBERS (New York Times, Nov. 9, 1991, AP). NOW IT'S 9 MILLION AND GROWING. ..JUST LIKE OUR DEBT/TAX MONEY SUPPLY...THE NUMBERS JUST KEEP COMING OUT OF THIN AIR...” I give this one to the author entirely. The numbers do keep growing, and most of that is bogus. People do make money off this stuff, I’m not going to deny it, but to ignore all of these accounts from both survivors and the Nazi’s themselves is like saying 9/11 didn’t happen at all and that all the videos were faked and there never was a World Trade Center.


P.S. Some people present “images” of Jewish weddings, or football games, etc taking place in concentration camps. This supposedly shows that concentration camps were not actually killing camps. These are never actual photographs, they are movie stills. These are from somebody else’s imagination, never take them seriously.


***Some Images Were Removed From This Page To Avoid Potential Lawsuits and/or Shutdowns. My apologies***
References:
Google Images

Saturday, October 30

Hatchetman Road

Before I begin, let me say that there are actually two Hatchetman stories. The better known one is in the area of Gobles, Michigan. There is also one in Huntsville, Ohio though. The two are of no relation, though they have very similar stories.
                The Michigan Hatchetman (http://www.michigansotherside.com/Articles/HatchetManRoad_Michigan.html) apparently haunts a patch of 28th avenue in Michigan. There are a couple stories in the link there of people claiming to have seen weird things. It would appear that the Michigan Hatchetman is more than just Paranormal. With ghost lights and beams from the sky, the Michigan Hatchetman is almost extraterrestrial. Unfortunately there aren’t many stories about him, making him a much lesser Urban Legend. Supposedly there is a fallout shelter somewhere in the area where the Hatchetman made his family live, eventually losing it and killing them all. Supposedly, if you leave your car idle near where his ghost is, then he will track you down and kill you with his hatchet.
                The Ohio Hatchetman (http://www.forgottenoh.com/Counties/Logan/hatchetman.html) doesn’t seem to have a set area, but from what I’ve found, the Hatchetman Road of Ohio is in Bristol. The Hatchetman in this story is named Andrew Hellman, a tailor from Germany. He too killed his family, poisoning a couple and hacking his wife to death. He hates women who stray onto his stretch of road.
                This is almost exactly like any other road/bridge haunting Urban Legend. Bunnyman, Goatman, Hatchetman, they are similar in more ways than just having “–man” at the end. My conclusion is that this is just another story made up to scare people sitting around a campfire; I can’t find anything other than “eyewitness accounts”. With no basis in fact, I label this one nothing but a legend.

Wednesday, October 27

Saturday, October 23

Blue Ghost of Parma

          Some of you probably remember this story from Parma, Ohio: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDvCChd1Fks
         
          Some people call it an angel. Some people say it looks like a plastic bag. One guy in the video says the gas station sits on an old Indian reservation (Indian reservation? Really? How many times have we heard that one before...). I say it looks like a bug...on the camera. In a couple places you see what looks like wings. I think they are indeed wings. I can't explain the color, as it does seems excessively blue, but perhaps the camera is run through some sort of blue filter?

          Anyways, I am more than satisfied with my answer. A bug sitting directly on the screen will appear blurred and can dance across the screen with either speed or slowness. It also has the capability to sit there for long periods of time, as this "Ghost" does. Here is a video of another "ghost" that I think 99% of you will agree shows a bug crawling across a camera: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2nlCdcVJVg&feature=player_embedded . So that's my two-cents on this "ghostly apparition". What's yours?

Josh Proctor


 I know a lot of my readers are from the same area I am, so take a look at the poster and let someone know if you've seen him. (Note: The last name should actually be spelled "Proctor". Dunno who made the poster.)

Wednesday, October 20

El Chupacabra

                El Chupacabra is a legendary cryptid found in many parts of the Americas, especially Latin United States, Mexico, and Puerto Rico. It is commonly associated with the killing of livestock and, supposedly, the draining of their blood. It has been spotted as far north as Maine. How much of this legend has basis in fact and how much of it is purely a legend?
                Everywhere I look I find varying accounts of what the creature supposedly looks like. From dog, to kangaroo, to humanoid, to alien/dragon, nobody can agree. This video is a rather creepy showing of the creature: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmHmnfgON4A&feature=related (warning: Language). I am going to go ahead and mark that video as a hoax in my mind, but you never know. Either way, it shows you how these people feel about this creature: It’s scary.
 
 


 


          











      There have been many cases of road kill being presumed to be a Chupacabra. Most of this evidence is dismissible by explanation of a dog with mange or a dog breed people are usually unfamiliar with, like a xoloitzcuintli. Personally I think a very large amount of these corpses can be explained by mammals with mange. There is no denying that a large animal with only little patchy spots of hair is flat out creepy looking, especially if you are a trigger-happy farmer watching after his sheep. Of course other people have some wonderful and “well educated” theories on this animal. Notice this YouTube user who very confidently states that “A chupacabra is a hybrid animal from PLANET EARTH people, its not a space alien, please do your research first. I understand people who were expecting an alien like species, but this is IT, its an animal that lives in hot areas all over the world.” (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wYemBLuou90)  Everything would be so much easier if we would all listen to these very intelligent YouTube users that know everything about the subjects they post videos of. I mean, duh, everyone knows Chupacabras live in hot areas all over the world! But no, seriously, people get really worked up over these easily dismissible pieces of carcass. This video right here is interesting: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdAwf2SAE7Q&feature=related it shows a small “alien baby” found in Mexico. Unfortunately I can’t find any more info on it and therefore will blow it off as a hoax.

                Some people go to real extremes to get their own Chupacabra corpse. Because this is such a growing market I have decided to write you all a step-by-step guide to making your own Chupacabra:
-Step 1: Find a dead dog. It is unadvisable to kill a dog yourself, instead find one dead on the side of the road. A wolf or coyote will do
-Step 2: Shave the dog completely bare (leaving a Mohawk is optional)
-Step 3: File down the canine teeth to a very, very sharp point
-Step 4: Come up with a story about how you spotted and killed the creature (If your story involves shooting the creature you may want to actually shoot the corpse somewhere)
-Step 5: Deny any claims that the creature may be a hoax or a dog with mange and stick with your story, but deny any DNA testing or viewing by experts
-Step 6: Create T-shirts and posters with the name of your town and “CHUPACABRA!”


               This is a great project to do with your kids on a rainy afternoon…just don’t tell anybody you learned how to do it from me. Other animal choices include rats, badgers, monkeys, chickens, or combinations of them all.
                Obviously the hardest part to brush off about the Chupacabra story is the victims. There have been many dead livestock found, usually sheep or goats, but occasionally cows, chicken and pigs. The weirdest part is in many cases the animals are found relatively uneaten, sometimes appearing to have just the blood sucked from them. Now I highly doubt anybody has actually drained the remaining blood and checked to see if any was missing, and they are probably just assuming because they see two fang marks in the neck that a Dracula-like creature killed their Sheep. Unfortunately for the Chupa case, most of the kills associated with Chupacabra don’t exhibit the vampiristic bite marks, but instead have large throat gashes that are typical of coyotes and other large canines, or even large cats. This doesn’t explain the fact that most of the livestock are uneaten, unless they are scared off by the farmer coming out to see if he can spot a Chupacabra.



                Unexplainable Chupacabra sightings are few and far between. Most are easily dismissible as a coyote. There is little footage or images of Chupacabras that is not easily explainable or outright faked.  I’m not going to post any eyewitness accounts because all the ones I can find sound so ridiculous I would feel like I was insane reposting, even if just to make fun of them.
                Conclusion: Chupacabra is not an unworldly being. I’m going to agree with “crazy YouTube ranter” who I quoted (and made fun of…) earlier in this post. I believe that Chupacabra may be out there, but it is not the hyped up creature everyone makes it out to be. It may be just a hit-and-run coyote, or perhaps a big cat not native to the area. Either way, I believe the eyewitness accounts are dismissible as coyotes, wolves, or dogs with mange. And I believe the killings are dismissible in other ways. What’s your opinion?
         
***Some Images Were Removed From This Page To Avoid Potential Lawsuits and/or Shutdowns. My apologies***
      
               
References:
Wikipedia (For images, dates, names, and description of events only)
Google Images (For some images)

Coming next week: Evolution vs. Creationism (probably the first of many)



Saturday, October 16

Island of the Dolls




                This is undoubtedly one of the creepiest stories I’ve ever heard. It combines two extremely creepy things: Dolls and Spirit/Demon Possession.  The story basically says that the island was inhabited by a child spirit who drowned whilst playing a game with her friends. She is offered tribute in the form of dolls. The one man who chose to live on the island, Julian Santana, would tie the dolls to trees and, basically, string them up. The images themselves are so morbid and disturbing it sends chills up your spine. Dolls are scary things anyways, but this is extreme. This place is now a tourist attraction. Of course it is supposedly still haunted (as if the rotting dolls weren’t scary enough on their own), and this child spirit will supposedly possess the dolls.



                People have claimed to hear the dolls whispering and/or follow their movements with their eyes or heads. Personally I’d like to visit this place…during the day preferably. Oh yeah, and Julian Santana, to top it off, was found dead (drowned) in the same place that little girl died many years before. The creepiness factor just multiplied itself by ten.

                Paranormal Investigation of the Island:
                Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahJoK6NT8VM
                Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEcg_nWs_Q0&feature=related
                Part 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QkEUa-tJrf0&feature=related (Up to 3:37)
                (Watch those, especially Part 2)
                Note: I’m not a firm believer in EVPs or Orbs, but these are weird

***Some Images Were Removed From This Page To Avoid Potential Lawsuits and/or Shutdowns. My apologies***

 
References:
Google Images

Saturday, October 9

New Saturday Posts

          Starting next week I will try and post on Saturdays as well. My Saturday posts, however, will be shorter and not always be subjects on which people have an opinion. In many cases it may just be analysing an eyewitness account or a one-shot cryptid (those creatures you hear one story about, then they seem to disappear). There won't be polls for these topics, but you are still free to comment. These are more than anything just stories you probably haven't heard about, or maybe have and didn't think much of it, that you can talk about with your friends.
          While I'm thinking of it: I would very much like it if you guys would comment on any of my posts with suggestions for future topics. I'm always open to new ideas. I have a list of future topics, but if enough people want a specific one I will bump it up in position.

Wednesday, October 6

The Apollo Moon Landings

                A more recent controversy I have heard is that the Apollo moon landings were a hoax. I believe it has for the most part died down, but I still would like to address it.


                On July 20, 1969, astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin of Apollo 11 were the first men to walk on the moon. Michael Collins remained in lunar orbit. A great moment for the history of mankind…and yet, people say there is evidence to prove it never happened.
                First off I’d like to say that there were six moon landings in the Apollo program. Seems to me like an awful long time to carry on a hoax like that. So right up that is a red flag in my mind against the conspiracy theory.
                The thing I hear pointed out most is the way the flag flutters in footage, though there is no wind. The most logical explanation I can give for this is that the astronaut placing the flag is causing it to move. All the videos I’ve seen have an astronaut messing with it, so that is my best guess. Really I can’t totally explain this one though.
                “There are no stars in any of the pictures”. This one is easy. The moon reflects light, we can tell this just by going outside and looking up at it. This reflection is intense enough to keep you from noticing stars in the pictures. It doesn’t make much sense just explaining it, so instead I have a picture of Chicago at night. The lights of the city are so intense you cannot see the stars. It is the same basic concept. And even if you ignore this fact, you have to take into account exposure time. To photograph stars is nearly impossible. Ever tried it?



                One thing I’ve heard a lot is that there is some report published by a Russian scientist in the 1950’s saying the moon is too radiated for a human to be on it. If the Russians truly believed this would they have not disputed the Apollo missions? I mean, seriously, what country wouldn’t want the chance to be the first to do something major like walk on the moon? I just don’t buy the radiation thing, but I must admit I don’t know enough about this one. Somebody help me out.

                The fact that there is apparently no crater beneath the Lunar Module I just flat out consider dismissible. On earth in weighed thirty-five thousand pounds. At one sixth gravity that would be less than six thousand, no? And just because it blows some dust doesn’t mean it will make a crater. I just can’t even try to buy into this one.
                Temperatures on the moon can reach some crazy extremes, and conspiracy theorists like to point out that the photographs should have either cracked or frozen at those temperatures. I believe however than because space is a vacuum, the heat is not as concentrated. But it’s very hard for me to honestly make a good reasoning for this.


                I also hear pretty often that the lighting “clearly shows” faking of images. I kind of think it’s ridiculous to assume that a more craterous, smaller, more reflective lunar body like the moon would shadow objects on its surface exactly the same way Earth does.
                The lunar rover was folded to fit into the landing module. That is that.  The argument, "the lunar rover is soooo big!!! There's, like, no way it could have been brought up there!", is just annoying. The rover was not "too big".

                After reviewing the evidence my conclusion is that the astronauts on Apollo 11 did indeed land on the moon. The fact that most leads me to believe this is the first fact I pointed out: that there have been five more missions since. It’s just too big of overkill in my mind. There would be no logical reason to do five more when we already had the honor of being the first if it wasn’t real.
               
     
***Some Images Were Removed From This Page To Avoid Potential Lawsuits and/or Shutdowns. My apologies***
          

References:
Wikipedia (For images, dates, names, and description of events only)
http://www.apolloarchive.com/apollo_gallery.html (Tons of images to make your own conclusions)
Coming up next week: Terrorism, the Red Herring?